Very soon, however, there were signs that the future might turn out to be not quite so simple and roseate as a delighted public dreamed. The 'illustrious Princess' might perhaps, after all, have something within her which squared ill with the easy vision of a well-conducted heroine in an edifying story-book. The purest intentions and the justest desires? No doubt; but was that all? To those who watched closely, for instance, there might be something ominous in the {53} curious contour of that little mouth. When, after her first Council, she crossed the ante-room and found her mother waiting for her, she said, 'And now, Mamma, am I really and truly Queen?' 'You see, my dear, that it is so.' 'Then, dear Mamma, I hope you will grant me the first request I make to you, as Queen. Let me be by myself for an hour.'[4] For an hour she remained in solitude. Then she reappeared, and gave a significant order: her bed was to be moved out of her mother's room. It was the doom of the Duchess of Kent. The long years of waiting were over at last; the moment of a lifetime had come; her daughter was Queen of England; and that very moment brought her own annihilation. She found herself, absolutely and irretrievably, shut off from every vestige of influence, of confidence, of power. She was surrounded, indeed, by all the outward signs of respect and consideration; but that made the inward truth of her position only the more intolerable. Through the mingled formalities of Court etiquette and filial duty, she could never penetrate to Victoria. She was unable to conceal her disappointment and her rage. 'Il n'y a plus d'avenir pour moi,' she exclaimed to Madame de Lieven; 'je ne suis plus rien.' For eighteen years, she said, this child had been the sole object of her existence, of her thoughts, her hopes, and now--no! she would not be comforted, she had lost everything, she was to the last degree unhappy.[5] Sailing, so gallantly and so pertinaciously, through the buffeting storms of life, the stately vessel, with sails still swelling and pennons flying, had put into harbour at last; to find there nothing--a land of bleak desolation.